


Dirty, Sharp, Perfect Pieces

by minchout



Category: Supernatural
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-06
Updated: 2012-11-06
Packaged: 2017-11-18 02:11:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/555736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/minchout/pseuds/minchout
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is the story of Sam and Dean. Really. Except Sam sort of likes to wear girl's clothes, and Dean's pretty okay with that. This is set in the Silk!Verse; you don't need to read the previous fics to follow this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dirty, Sharp, Perfect Pieces

~12,000 words

Dirty, Sharp, Perfect Pieces

I.

Sam stood naked in front of the full-length mirror bolted to the back of the bathroom door. It was a cheap thing, dingy with a crack in the corner, but Sam was pleased with it anyway. It wasn’t often that motel rooms had full-length mirrors. He was usually stuck with a dingy rectangle lit by fluorescents and bolted above a bathroom sink. If he was lucky, there was a mirror above the dresser. 

It wasn’t that Sam was worried about his appearance; there wasn’t a vanity behind Sam’s curiosity, his desire to study himself top to bottom. It was just that, with little access to mirrors, Sam was rarely able to fully _see_ himself. He walked around day to day feeling like one person—Sam the huntress, sleek and graceful, tough and good with a knife and gun but even better with her knowledge of what was out there; Sammy, sister and lover to Dean, her partner and fellow hunter—but inevitably, when she looked in the mirror, she was reminded of who she was to the rest of the world: a tall, gangly almost-man with too long hair and a hardness that made him unapproachable. 

He was tall now, taller than Dean, his neck long, his hips narrow, his legs straight—smooth because he’d let Dean shave him the night before—and his cock hung thick and veiny, soft and ugly against his balls. Ugly though it was to him, he didn’t mind his cock. Not really. At least, he’d never felt the need to get rid of it the way he’d read some people like him did. Dean liked Sam’s cock, and Sam liked that Dean liked it. So the cock was necessary, if occasionally annoying and alien. 

He tugged at himself, measured the smooth weight of his balls in his other hand, pressed a finger up against his taint. They’d been two weeks on a hard hunt, and they hadn’t fucked in almost all that time. If Sam was feeling pent up and aroused at just the thought of Dean’s hands on him, then he knew Dean was horny too and would probably tumble Sam through the sheets as soon as he’d finished his shower. 

Sam walked to the bed and stretched out on top of the scratchy old comforter, idly playing with himself, with his cock, his nipples, one long finger reaching way down and circling his hole. When Dean stepped out of the bathroom, a threadbare towel faded to a sad blue around his waist, Sam posed for his brother, spreading his legs and arching his neck. 

Sam expected Dean to look at him, smirk and say something straight out of Casa Erotica; instead, Dean dropped his towel and pounced onto the end of the bed, sending a shockwave through the mattress and jostling Sam out of position. 

“Ow!” Sam said. He glared at Dean. “You’re always such an asshole.”

Dean grinned, curled a hand around Sam’s calf and tugged him down the bed. “Yeah, but I’m your asshole,” he said.

“Oh, I’m not even touching that one with a ten foot pole.”

“C’mon, Sammy,” Dean said, crawling over his brother until his face was above Sam’s. He was leaning on his elbows and grinning down at him, his skin warm from the shower, his cock fattening up against Sam’s hip. “Let’s fuck.”

Sam gasped as Dean’s hand curled around his cock. He tilted his head back for real this time, no pose at all, and Dean dragged his nose and lips up Sam’s smooth neck, latched onto his pulse point and set up shop sucking a bruise into the skin while he stripped Sam’s cock, hard and fast.

“Want you in me,” Sam gasped, already on the verge of coming way too soon. 

“Hush up, Samantha,” Dean said. “No one likes a pushy bottom.” He pressed his lips right up against Sam’s ear. “Don’t worry, baby girl. I’m gonna get that pussy of yours nice and wet, fuck you so hard you’ll feel me for days.”

Sam shuddered, curling his hands against Dean’s biceps and opening his legs wider. He tossed his head to the side.

“But first?” Dean said. “First I’m gonna milk you dry, make you all soft like a good girl should be.”

Sam felt his orgasm all he way to the soles of his feet. His toes curled, and he dug his nails into Dean’s arm as he shot across Dean’s hand and his own stomach and chest. When it was over, aftershocks racing through him like a smooth stone skipping across pond water, Dean kept stroking his cock, painful now, and Sam moaned, “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” until Dean had him hard again, sweat beading across his hairline, Dean’s breath ragged in his ear, his cock hard and dripping against Sam’s thigh. 

Dean grabbed his hips then, manhandled Sam onto his stomach then put him on his hands and knees. He used Sam’s come to roughly shove two fingers inside of him. This wasn’t meant to open Sam up; Sam knew what this was, and the anticipation made him shocky with arousal, his breath coming too fast, his cock painful between his legs as Dean pressed his fingers against Sam’s prostate, massaging it again and again, relentless until Sam’s cock was leaking a steady stream of come. Dean kept at it until Sam was milked clean, his cock pulsing dry, then he put Sam onto his back, more gentle now, and took Sam’s cock into his mouth, cleaning him, suckling until Sam was soft, boneless and sated. He wouldn’t get hard again tonight, which was exactly what Dean wanted—or maybe it was what Sam wanted, and Dean wanted it, too, because he wanted whatever Sam wanted. All the time and forever.

Dean took his time then, covering his fingers with lube and spreading Sam open, working his fingers into Sam’s hole, two three four, until Sam was breathless and squirming, shoving back onto Dean’s fingers and begging for it. Dean finally hitched Sam’s long legs up over his shoulders, lined up his cock, and fucked his way in, bending Sam—loose, his legs dangling, his neck bared—nearly in half. When Dean finally came, his hand was tangled in the hair at the nape of Sam’s neck, his nose was pressed to the line of Sam’s jaw, and his bottom lip dragged a slow, wet line across Sam’s Adam’s apple as he groaned out with his release. 

When they’d both caught their breath and Dean softened enough to pull out, Dean stood and Sam watched, admiring the line of his back, the curve of his ass, the bow of his legs, as he padded across the room. He rummaged through Sam’s duffle before disappearing into the bathroom. When he reappeared, he had an old t-shirt, warm and damp, and he took his time cleaning Sam. He threw the t-shirt onto the floor, then he looked up at Sam from beneath his lashes. He looked nervous, and Sam reached down, rubbed his thumb through the short, prickly hair above Dean’s ear.

“Dean?” he asked. 

“I, uh,” Dean said. He held out his hand like an offering. In his palm, bunched and wrinkled, was a pair of Sam’s panties.

Sam raised his eyebrow. He knew Dean knew he wore them. Dean had known who Sam was since Sam himself had figured it out at eleven-years-old. And now that they were working together again, travelling together, fucking, ever since Jess…well, Dean was more comfortable with Sam now than he’d ever been, now that their Dad was off God knows where and wasn’t around to tell Sam to man up and Dean to be his good soldier. But still, there was kink—calling Sam a good girl and his asshole a pussy, or shaving his legs as foreplay—but then there was everyday—Sam wearing silk panties because they felt good against freshly shaved skin, because he liked tucking his cock away and feeling smooth and bare, Sam wearing a dress and combat boots when they weren’t hunting, tying his hair into a loose knot to pull it away from his face. Dean let him get away with that stuff without comment. He didn’t even seem to mind it. But he didn’t participate. 

It bothered Sam, but it was better now than when he was a teenager. He’d known then that Dean didn’t care, that Sam could be whatever the fuck he wanted and Dean would still be there, big brother and protector. But it was always so goddamned hard. Their dad always pushing Sam, always looking at him like Sam hadn’t come from his seed, like he didn’t know who Sam was or who he might turn out to be. And Dean, always the peace-keeper, always telling Sam he knew it was hard, but couldn’t he just try? Couldn’t he just for once not be so goddamned selfish and think of his family? 

So Sam knew that this moment—Dean holding out Sam’s panties like an offering—meant something to both of them, and he couldn’t stop himself from turning his face to the side and blinking, his throat suddenly too thick like he wanted to cry. 

Dean scoffed at that. “C’mon, Samantha. Take them.” 

Sam reached out, took the bunched up fabric, scooted up the bed so he could fold his legs and pull them on. Dean watched as Sam tucked his cock away, aroused again, though Sam didn’t call him on it. 

Once he was comfortable, Sam cleared his throat. “Thanks,” he said, his voice rough. Rougher than he liked. 

Dean just shrugged. “We don’t gotta hug or nothing, do we?”

Sam laughed. “No,” he smiled, feeling coy now that the soft fabric was snug against him. “But I’ll be the little spoon if you want.”

Dean shook his head, but he let Sam grab his arms and pull him up his body. They squirmed and kicked until they were both comfortable, Sam’s head pillowed on Dean’s arm, Dean’s hand casually possessive over Sam’s waist, his fingers brushing the fabric of the silk against Sam’s cock. 

II.

Sam was sixteen the first time he and Dean fooled around. Dad had dropped them off in Kansas City, Missouri, not even bothering to make sure the run-down little house he’d rented over the phone was in any kind of livable condition before going off on his hunt. Dean and Sam were old enough now that Sam knew Dad’d be gone a month, maybe even two or three. One hunt would bleed into another would bleed into another and maybe Sam would even get to finish out the semester in the same school. And with Dad out of the way, maybe Sam could even go to school dressed like himself. 

Their dad had cut Sam’s hair when Sam was eleven; he’d come home from a hunt to find Sam dressed like a girl, and he’d taken his clippers and buzzed it right down to Sam’s scalp. He’d said it was for training, but Sam knew it was because of something else. The past couple of years, though, ever since Sam had gotten good enough to hide what needed to be hidden, since Sam had started helping with the hunt of the week in between school work and research, John had gotten lax about the whole high and tight thing, and Sam’s hair was getting long again. It was long enough to tuck behind his ears, chunks of it flipping out behind them in a way that made him smile when he looked in the mirror.

Dean had been teaching him how to hustle pool, so Sam had a little money socked away. While Dean settled into the house by fussing with the plumbing—the water was spewing out of the faucet a murky brown; fucking shocker, that—Sam went to search out the town. He told Dean he wanted to get the lay of the place; what he was really looking for was the nearest Goodwill. For once in his life, he’d show up at his new school dressed how he wanted to dress instead of in Dean’s hand-me-downs, which were getting too short in the sleeve and leg for Sam anyway. 

Sam made a bee-line for the girls’ section. If Dean were with him, he’d at least make a show of poking through the boys’ before browsing through the girls’ while Dean paid, but on his own, he could do whatever the fuck he wanted. Sam knew exactly who he was. He was tough and smart, and he had never fit in no matter where he went, and he wanted clothes that showed that. 

He walked back to the house, plastic bags bulging with what he’d found. Dean raised an eyebrow at him when he walked through the door. 

“What?” Sam said, automatically defensive. “I used my own money.” 

“I didn’t say anything,” Dean said. He collapsed onto one of the kitchen chairs and propped his feet up on the table, leaned back. 

“All my clothes are getting too small,” Sam said. 

“Sam,” Dean said. “I didn’t say anything. I get it. You’ve got limbs like a colt all of a sudden. You’ve been needing new shit for a while. I should’ve taken you.”

Sam just shrugged. He moved to dump all his new stuff in the room they’d be sharing. 

“There’s only one bed,” he said. 

“Yep,” Dean said. He was flipping through a magazine, not even remotely interested. 

“Dean,” Sam said. “One bed.”

Dean rolled his eyes. “We’ve shared before, Sam. Who cares?”

“You’re a cover hog,” Sam said, but what he wanted to say was, _I don’t want to wake up in the morning with my boner pressed against your leg._ He turned his face away and cleared his throat. “I’m gonna go, uh, study.”

Dean smirked. “There’s tissues next to the bed.”

“Fuck you,” Sam said. 

“Hey, man, I’m just saying; I remember what sixteen was like.” 

Sam slammed the door behind him.

***

The morning of Sam’s first day at his new school, he walked into the kitchen, and Dean was already up. He was dressed to go out looking for work and pouring bowls of cereal. Sam was a little flustered already, and there was cinnamon toast sitting next to his raisin bran, which made him flush and a pleased smile spread across his face. Dean hadn’t made him cinnamon toast in years. 

Sam expected an answering smile when he looked up at Dean; what he got instead were Dean’s wide eyes, Dean nervously licking at his bottom lip.

“Sam,” he said. 

“What?” Sam said, though he knew what had Dean looking at him like that. He tugged at the hem of his dress, nervous. It was a dark plum color, buttoned down the front and fitted at the waist with an A-line skirt that hit Sam mid-thigh, and he’d picked it specifically because it reminded him of Winona Ryder in _Reality Bites_. His hair looked like hers, too, and he thought the look worked for him. He crossed an arm over his stomach, hunching his shoulders a bit. 

Dean’s voice when he finally found it was resigned, a little sad. “You can’t go to school like that,” he said.

“Why not?” Sam said. “Dad’s not here to stop me.” 

“Because we’re in fucking Kansas City, Missouri, not New York. You’re gonna get your ass kicked.” 

Sam scoffed. “I can take care of myself.”

“Yeah, well,” Dean said. “You shouldn’t have to.”

“I’m not changing, Dean,” Sam said. When Dean looked like he wanted to protest, Sam stopped him. “Look,” he said. “No one knows who I am. They’ll just think I’m a girl. I’ll tell the teachers Sam’s short for Samantha.”

Dean sighed, dragged a hand down across his face. “You’re not twelve anymore, Sammy.”

“Yeah and this isn’t just some phase, Dean, no matter how much you and Dad want to think it is. This is me. You don’t like it? Tough.”

“That’s not what I mean,” Dean said. “But yeah, Dad’d be pissed if he saw you right now. And I can’t blame him, Sam. You stand out like this. What we do? It’s not good to stand out.”

“Fuck hunting,” Sam said. 

“You can’t pass for a girl,” Dean said, blunt. “Not anymore. Not one person’s gonna look at you and think you’re a girl.”

Sam’s eyes prickled, and he blinked back the sudden tears.

“You’re a fucking sasquatch, kiddo,” Dean said, his voice soft, teasing. 

Sam lashed out, hit Dean with the palms of his hands right in the center of his chest, knocking him backwards and into the unsteady little table holding their breakfast. One bowl of raisin bran fell to the floor, milk and bran flakes exploding all over the place.

Dean cursed and righted himself. 

“I’m sorry,” Sam said. He didn’t know if he was apologizing for the mess or for being the way he was. 

“Yeah,” Dean said on a sigh. “I know you are, man.”

Sam moved to clean up the mess, but Dean stopped him. 

“Leave it,” he said. “Go get your school shit, and I’ll drive you in. At least let me do that.”

“Yeah, okay,” Sam said.

They were both silent for most of the drive, the only noise between them the rumble of the Impala and Sam’s quiet directions as he pointed Dean toward the school. Sam could easily have walked it, but he knew that no matter what he said, Dean would give him a ride until he got a job that kept him from it. And Sam liked riding with his brother. 

When Dean pulled up to the school, he didn’t get out the way Sam was half expecting him to. Usually he’d lean against the car, a long, lean, intimidating sprawl, hands shoved into Dad’s old leather jacket, the collar popped, showing anyone who wanted to pick on the new kid that Sam was protected. It didn’t matter that Sam could fight just as well as Dean, didn’t matter that Sam kept a butterfly knife in his boot and a switchblade in his bag. Dean would do what he thought he had to do, the same way Sam would. They were alike in that—both of them opinionated, stubborn in their beliefs and desires. 

So when Dean changed the routine, when he stayed behind the wheel squinting into the sun, Sam stayed put, too. 

“You gonna look for work?” Sam said.

Dean nodded once, just a jerk of his chin. “Saw one of those $19.99 oil change places on the way into town. They had a help wanted sign.”

“Dean,” Sam said, his lips twisting. “No more scams, all right?” Last time Dean had gotten a job at one of those places, he’d charmed all the female customers into paying cash for the oil change and Dean had pocketed the money without recording the transaction. He’d gotten caught and their Dad had to bail him out of the county jail before dragging them to a new town.

“No more scams,” Dean agreed.

“I mean it.” 

“So do I.” Dean looked over at him. “Sammy, Dad might be a while this time. I’m gonna have to keep whatever job I get.”

“He told you he would be a while?”

Dean shrugged. “Not exactly. You know how he is.”

Sam snorted. “You mean I know how he’s an asshole?”

Dean gave him a warning look, eyebrow raised, but he let the comment slide for once. “It was just something he said. I don’t know. I can’t put my finger on it.” 

Sam nodded. He moved to get out of the car, but Dean stopped him with a hand on his arm.

“Don’t let anyone give you shit, you hear me Sammy?”

“Course not, Dean.”

Dean smirked. “You may be wearing a dress, but you’re still a Winchester.”

“Damn right,” Sam said. 

***

Dean was right. Sam was a Winchester, which meant it didn’t matter whether he wore a dress or Dean’s hand-me-downs, either way he was still a freak. Kansas City was Bible country, full of Pentecostals, and even if Sam could pass for a girl in his dress, he still stood out. The girls here wore skirts no shorter than the knee, their long, uncut hair braided back or in piles on top of their heads, wisps or ringlets framing their dour faces. He walked the hall of his new school looking for the office, and he felt like fucking Moses parting the red sea. Groups of kids clutching books to their chests watched him, some silent, some whispering. If he were Dean, he’d smirk at them, maybe sidle up to the nearest girl and call her sweetheart just to make her blush. He wasn’t Dean, though, so he just kept his head down and clomped down the hall, his bootsteps heavy in the silence. It was a relief when the bell rang and everyone scrambled to class, though it meant Sam would be late. 

In the office, the receptionist watched him walk up to the desk, a friendly smile on her face. Though the smile faltered for a second when Sam came close, it came back almost immediately, and it didn’t seem fake to Sam. Sam had a lot of experience with fake. 

“How can I help you, hon?” she said.

“Um, I’m new,” Sam said. “Sam Winchester.”

“Sam, huh?” she said, looking at her computer screen and clicking keys. 

“Yeah,” Sam said.

“Must be a smart kid,” she said. “All AP classes.” 

“You have my transcripts already?” 

“Yep. Your brother brought them in yesterday. Handsome boy? Freckles?” She patted her hair. Her nails were long, painted bright pink. They made Sam smile and wish he still had the bottle of nail polish he’d stolen from the drug store two towns back. 

“That’s him,” Sam said. 

“I told him if I was ten years younger, I’d give him a run for his money,” she said. She winked, then reached to pull his schedule from the printer.

Sam laughed. “I bet he liked that,” he said.

“Oh, I think he did,” she said. “Now scoot. You’re late for Anatomy.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Sam said. 

***

The receptionist was the only good part of Sam’s day. By the time school let out, he’d had three separate run-ins with boys calling him fag and freak and shoving him around. One kid had even pulled his hair, wrapped a huge hunk of it in his sweaty, footballer’s fist and pulled hard enough Sam had almost fallen flat on his ass and had a sore scalp the rest of the day. At least that was a creative torture. He couldn’t say the same for the rest of it. The sameness of it all was comforting in a way; high school bullies were predictable, no matter the dominant race or religion of the school and town. 

When school let out, Sam planted himself on the front steps at the main entrance and damn whoever had to walk around him. He ignored the bumps and shoulder shoves until he realized Dean must’ve found work and wouldn’t show, so he walked back to the house. 

Sam was hungry, but there wasn’t any food in the house, so he settled himself into his homework, camped out at the kitchen table with an anatomy book spread before him and worked on memorizing the names of every bone in the human skeleton. He knew most of them already, had learned them out of necessity: the patella—Dean had shattered his when a poltergeist in Arkansas had tossed him and he’d landed on his knee. He still limped in bad weather—and the clavicle, scapula, and humerus—Dean had broken all of them at once plus a couple of ribs in a fall from a second story window running from the police after taking out a witch. He’d been in an almost full body cast for months. 

Everything had been difficult for Dean in that cast, even the smallest of tasks, and their dad had left them in a trailer on the edge of some nowhere town in Texas with Dean too hurt to work and Sam too young to make up the difference. Dad had been forced to come back more often to make sure they had enough food and cash, and he’d spent almost every minute he’d had to be in that trailer drunk; when he wasn’t drunk, he’d been lecturing Dean about all the lives he could be saving if Dean hadn’t gotten hurt. Dean had taken it all, nothing more than “yes, sir”s and “I’m sorry, sir”s like their dad had some right to treat him that way. 

Sam had spent the year leading up to that in training, working his eleven-year-old body as hard as he could. The memory of his dad’s face in the mirror while he’d shaved all Sam’s long hair off was constantly present, driving him to work hard and then harder. But seeing Dean treated like that broke whatever respect Sam had had for the man. 

That injury was what had made Dean finally drop out of high school. Dad made a show of caring, but Sam knew he didn’t, not really, not when Dean finally healed and started studying for his GED and Dad, during one particularly difficult hunt, had silently removed the textbook from his son’s lap and put his own journal in its place. 

“This is more important right now,” he’d said. 

“Yes, sir,” Dean said, but Sam saw the slight twitch at the corner of his mouth that tugged his lips into a frown, saw him rub his hand across his face, then shake his head and settle in to read about skinwalkers as if they were the only thing that mattered. 

Later, when Dean and Dad had gone out on the hunt, Sam fished the book out of the trash where Dean had thrown it. He scraped coffee grounds from the pages, set it out in the sun to let the back cover dry. Then he’d set it on the end of Dean’s twin bed for him to find. Sam never saw the book again, but Dean had his GED by the summer. 

***

Dean got home late that night. Sam had ordered pizza when Dean hadn’t shown in time for dinner, and he watched as Dean grabbed a cold, stiff slice from the greased-through cardboard box on the coffee table in front of the couch. He settled in beside Sam and groaned like an old man. 

“You found a job, then?” 

“Yep.”

“Something good?”

“Nope.”

“Dean…”

“It’ll pay the bills, Sammy.”

Sam shrugged. “I know.”

Dean turned to him, his lips shiny with pizza grease. “What happened to your dress?” he said.

Sam just raised an eyebrow. “Dude. It’s almost midnight. I wasn’t planning to sleep in the thing.” He plucked at the cotton of his t-shirt. It was faded, a hole at the hem, a stain above the heart. It had been Dean’s at some point.

Dean nodded, turned toward the TV that wasn’t on.

“Besides,” Sam said. “I’m thinking…I don’t know. I’m thinking the whole thing was pretty dumb. I’ll dress like a boy tomorrow. I’ll dress normal.”

“Don’t you dare,” Dean said. 

Sam looked at him, startled. Dean looked tired, his face an open book in a way it almost never was, but even still, Sam couldn’t figure out what he saw there.

“You dress however the fuck you wanna dress, you hear me? No one has the right to tell you anything else.”

“And when Dad gets back?” Sam said. 

Dean shrugged and settled back into the couch. “Can’t hunt in a dress,” he said.

“Yeah,” Sam said. “That’s what I thought.” 

Dean turned the TV on, but Sam snatched the remote and turned it off.

“You know, you could stick up for me once in a while, Dean.”

“What the fuck? I always stick up for you,” Dean said. He looked genuinely baffled, and that just pissed Sam off even more.

“Yeah, sure. When it doesn’t matter,” he said. “When it’s some dumb bully at school I don’t give a shit about and could beat up myself. Or when we’re all alone. You know, you can talk all you want, but in the end, you think I’m just as much of a freak as Dad does.”

“Sam—” 

“He’s the only one whose opinion matters to you, and you always take his side. Always. He doesn’t like who I am, so I have to pretend to be someone else.”

“I know.”

“And you were the one who made me think this was okay. That I was okay. You always tell me I’m okay.”

“You are.”

Sam shook his head, his hair flapping. “I’m not,” he said.

At some point during Sam’s rant, Dean had scooted closer on the couch. He put his arm around Sam now and tugged him until Sam was resting with his cheek against Dean’s shoulder.

“I wish I didn’t have to be a freak,” Sam mumbled. He tipped his head up and looked at his brother, and before he knew what was happening, Dean was mumbling “I know, kiddo,” and Sam was pushing up, bringing his and Dean’s lips together in a soft, dry press of a kiss. When it was finished, Sam didn’t want to pull away. He liked the feel of his brother’s hot breath against his mouth, and the flutter of his brother’s eyelids as he tried to focus with Sam’s face so close to his own. 

When the spell broke, Dean jumped like a startled horse. He started to pull away, and Sam grabbed his face in both of his hands, mumbled “no, no, no” against his lips and followed him down until Dean was on his back, Sam on top of him, both of them hard. Sam could feel the press of Dean’s cock through the denim against his bare thigh where Sam’s boxers had ridden up, and he reached down with one hand and squeezed at his brother, rubbing him through the thick material. Dean squirmed his face away, his mouth open and panting against the back of the sofa as Sam brought him off, made his brother come in his jeans. 

Dean mumbled, “Damn it, Sam,” then he grabbed Sam by the ass and dragged his hips closer to Dean’s leg, urging Sam to rub off against him. By the time Sam finally came, they were both sticky with cooling come and sweat, and Dean’s mouth was open and wet against the line of Sam’s jaw. It felt like he was sucking a bruise there, so Sam laughed, his voice rough, and squirmed until he was resting on top of Dean, his head on his brother’s chest. 

“You’re lucky you’re still such a fucking bean sprout,” Dean said. “Otherwise you’d be too heavy for this.”

Sam rubbed his cheek against Dean’s shirt like a cat. “You smell like garlic,” he said.

Dean sighed. “Yeah, I know. It’s this fucking job.”

“Is it a job at the Pasta House?”

Dean snorted. He fell silent for a time, then, “Sam. Sammy. We’ve gotta talk about this.” 

“I know,” Sam said. “Just not now, okay?”

“Yeah,” Dean said. “Okay.”

 

III.

When Sam and Dean first started hunting together again, after Jess burned to death on the ceiling of that shitty little apartment and Sam had called Dean because he didn’t know what else to do or who else to turn to, they finally talked about whatever it was between them. It was the only time they ever talked about it, and though Sam wanted to talk about it again and again, wanted to pick it apart and lay all its dirty, sparkly, sharp, and perfect pieces out under a too-bright light and sort through them, he never brought it up. Dean had run from it once, and Sam didn’t want to do or say anything that might make him run again. 

One cool spring night after they’d taken out a shifter in St. Louis, Dean was in a contemplative sort of mood because the thing had stolen his face before they’d killed it, and he was still coming to terms with the fact that he was legally dead because of it. They were sitting on the hood of the Impala, each of them with a beer in hand. Sam’s was only half drunk and he was holding it against his jeans so the sweating bottle didn’t leave rings on Dean’s baby. His legs looked long and skinny in the moon’s light. He was wearing the boots Dean bought him—a pair of woman’s combat boots, clunky and useful for the hunt, but feminine in the way they hugged his calves when they were laced up just right—and Dean had hooked his foot beneath Sam’s ankle so they were tangled together. Sam rested a hand against Dean’s thigh. His brother was warm, alive, and he knew Sam inside and out. He knew what Sam loved, what he hated, what he feared. He knew the way Sam felt guilty about Jess. How, had it not been for Sam, she would still be safe and happy in some dorm instead of rotting in a grave in Palo Alto. 

Sam took a drink of his beer, shifted closer to his brother. 

“Still wish I could’ve seen my funeral,” Dean said. He said it like he didn’t really mean it. He said it like he’d said it just to talk. 

“I’ve seen enough funerals this year,” Sam said. 

“You miss her?” Dean said. He kept his face turned away. “Of course you miss her.”

“Yeah,” Sam said. “I miss her. But this? You and me?” he squeezed Dean’s thigh. “It’s good. It’s all I ever wanted, really.”

Dean was quiet for a long time. Then, “Me too.”

“Yeah?” Sam said. Maybe he shouldn’t have been surprised, but he was. He was the one who’d pursued this, not Dean. He kissed Dean first; he kept at Dean all those six months they were in Kansas City until Dad showed up and Dean pushed Sam away; he’d started it up again in that dirty, abandoned hotel outside of Boulder three months after Jess. 

Dean snorted into his beer bottle. “’Course,” he said, like for Sam to have thought anything else was stupid. “You’re it for me, Sammy. You gotta know that. Maybe it’s fucked. Hell, I _know_ it’s fucked. But it is what it is.”

“I don’t want you thinking it’s fucked,” Sam said.

“Can’t always get what you want, Sam,” Dean said. 

Sam knew that. Of course he did. That didn’t stop him from being pissed every single time he was brought up short by the fact of it, though. 

He tucked a strand of hair behind his ear. His loose half-bun was all wonky because of the way he was resting against the windshield, and he took the tie out of his hair, let it fall long around his neck. Dean was on him suddenly, his hand in Sam’s hair, his thigh pressed between Sam’s legs. 

“You’re fucking beautiful, you know that?” 

Sam grinned. “Tell me something I don’t know.” 

“You’re everything,” Dean said, serious. He tugged Sam’s hair, his grip rough. “You got that? I don’t care how fucked it is. You’re everything.”

“Yeah,” Sam said. “Okay. It’s okay, Dean.” He smoothed his hand down Dean’s side.

“And if you ever tell anyone I said something so girly, I’m gonna publish your freshman year poetry journal, Samantha.”

Sam laughed and shoved his brother sideways. 

Dean yelped. “Watch the paint job!”

Sam slid off the hood of the car and pulled Dean with him, walked his brother backwards, his hand fisted in Dean’s jacket. 

“Take me somewhere, or take me to the backseat, Dean. Cause you’re gonna fuck me good and hard.” He pressed Dean up against the driver’s side door. “You’re gonna fuck me nice and sloppy, then when you can man up and get hard again, I’m gonna suck your brains out through your dick.”

“Fuck,” Dean said. “There’s a blanket in the trunk. We could…” 

“I don’t need it to be fancy.”

Dean shoved Sam backwards and made for the trunk, though Sam could barely keep his hands to himself the whole time. He kept one hand on Dean’s back as he used the other to palm at his own cock through his jeans. They were just tight enough he’d be able to see the line of it, plump and ready, a wet spot soaking through the denim. 

Dean found what he was looking for and tossed it to the grass beside the car. They barely got the blanket straightened before they were on top of it and on top of each other, and by the time Dean had his dick in Sam’s ass, the blanket was a hopeless bunch of fabric beneath them. When they were finished, they were both covered in dirt and grass, giddy and tired, and they brushed each other off, hands lingering, before climbing back into the car to search out a place to lay their heads for the night. 

 

IV. 

Sam was seventeen when he set out on his own. He’d just started his senior year in high school, and after so long with just him and Dean in Kansas City—him and Dean screwing around and learning the ins and out of each others bodies, him and Dean and Sam finally able to be who he actually was, to dress how he wanted and to love who he wanted—after all of that, Sam had decided it wasn’t worth it to fake it for his Dad’s sake anymore. Sure, Dad didn’t need to know what he and Dean got up to in the dark, but if Sam wanted to go to school in a dress, if he wanted to shave his legs and his armpits and borrow cotton candy lip gloss from Kelly in his Calculus class, then he’d do just that and no amount of John Winchester yelling at him was going to change a damn thing. 

Unfortunately for Sam, John hadn’t gotten the message. 

They were about five months outside of Kansas City. They’d settled in Flagstaff in a little abandoned house nestled at the base of the San Francisco Peaks, and they were hunting a spirit that was haunting a stretch of road and luring travelers from their cars and up into the peaks. Not one of the travelers had ever returned. 

It had been a week and a half since the last town and Sam’s last school. He’d overheard Dean telling their Dad that he should get Sam enrolled, that Flagstaff was nice and maybe they should make it their base of operations until Sam finished up. Dad had just grunted “maybe,” but it was looking more and more like that wouldn’t be happening. 

Dad made the announcement one night that the three of them would be hiking into the peaks that morning. Sam had dug up a missing persons report on a woman who’d disappeared in this area over fifty years ago while on a road trip with her new husband. The couple’s car had broken down, and though the man had somehow made it back into town, the woman had never been heard from again. The man said they’d argued, and she’d taken off in one direction while he’d gone the other. John suspected she’d died out there, and her bones were abandoned somewhere in the peaks. 

“This is a bad idea,” Sam said. He watched his brother pack a small bag of things he thought they’d need on the hunt—rock salt, a sawed-off with iron rounds, his zippo. “Dean!” Sam said. “Are you listening to me? None of that shit is hiking supplies.”

“We don’t _own_ hiking supplies,” Dean said.

“Exactly. Man, we’re gonna get out there and get just as lost as that woman did. She could be anywhere, and not one of us knows what we’re doing.”

“It’ll be okay, Samantha. Don’t get your panties in a bunch.”

“Fuck you,” Sam said. He crossed his arms over his flat, boney chest and looked away, more hurt by the words than he wanted to be. 

His brother sighed, rubbed a hand down across his face. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

Sam shrugged. “Dean. Don’t go. Please? I’ve got a bad feeling about this one.”

“You always have a bad feeling.”

Sam uncrossed his arms and tangled one fist in the hem of Dean’s t-shirt. “I don’t like thinking of you hurt out there.” 

Dean grabbed Sam’s hand, pushed it away. “Quit that,” he said. 

Sam stood, pushing into Dean’s space. “Make me,” he said.

Dean shoved him back a step. “I said quit it. Dad’s in the next room.”

“Oh, right,” Sam said. “I forgot. You can’t be anything other than daddy’s perfect little soldier. What was I thinking?”

“It has nothing to do with that.”

“Yeah. Right.”

“Sam,” Dean said. “Please. Can we just get ready for this fucking hunt?” 

“I’m not going.” Sam sat back onto the saggy bed and crossed his arms over his chest.

“Yeah.” Dean said. “Right.” He snorted and shook his head, turned away.

“I mean it, Dean. I’m not going.”

“We’ve got a job to do. Besides, you’re crazy if you think Dad’s gonna let you just stay behind.” 

“Crazy, huh?” Sam stood and barreled out into the living room where their Dad was two beers and a quarter of a bottle of Jack down. 

He looked up at Sam, stone-faced, one eyebrow raised in that very Dean-like way. Dean looked like their Dad, though Dad said Dean looked like Mom. Sam didn’t look like anyone. It was like he wasn’t even part of this fucking family. 

“I’m not going,” he said. He straightened his shoulders. He was 6’2” last time he was measured, taller than Dad and Dean, and he’d use it if he had to.

“What?” John said. He looked over Sam’s shoulder at Dean.

“Don’t ask me,” Dean said at the same time Sam said, “Don’t look at him.”

Dad scratched his beard. “Somebody better start making sense.”

“I’m not going on the hunt,” Sam said.

If possible, Dad’s eyebrow arched even further. “Is that right?” he said.

“Yes, sir.”

“Who said you had a choice?”

“I did,” Sam said. “You can’t make me go.” 

“Son, if you aren’t in that car at oh five-hundred, I’m gonna drag your ass out of bed, hog-tie you and put you in the back seat, you got me?”

Sam knew his Dad. He would do just that if Sam really put him in a bad mood. And somehow, that thought just made Sam even angrier.

“You just try to touch me. I’ll fight you every step,” he said.

“And what exactly are you planning to do instead? What, you’re just gonna sit here useless?”

“Better than going out there and getting lost.”

“There are people dying, Sam.”

“I don’t care,” Sam said. His words sounded suddenly too loud in the small room. It wasn’t something he’d ever said before, and he didn’t even really know if it was true. Of course he didn’t want anybody else to die, but why couldn’t he just once not have to be the one to save them? Why did they always have to be the ones to do it?

John unfolded from the couch. “You don’t care,” he said. His voice was entirely without inflection. 

“Dad,” Dean said from his corner.

“That’s right,” Sam said. He tipped his chin up, looked his father in the eye. 

“You’re spoiled,” John said. “I’ve been too easy on you.”

John pinched the fabric of Sam’s shirt between his thumb and forefinger, and Sam flinched. The shirt was silky and soft against his hairless chest, sleeveless, and the cut of the buttons and the v of the neck all marked it unmistakably a girl’s shirt. 

“I’ve been letting you dress like this,” John said, “act out this little charade because Dean told me I should, that it makes you happy. And that’s fine. It’s not like I don’t want you to be happy, and if it doesn’t get in the way of the hunt, then fine. But I’m done with it now. That’s not your life. School? Girls or boys or whoever the hell it is you’re trying to impress by looking this way? That’s not your life. You’re a hunter, and it’s time you manned up and acted like one.” 

“You think this is some game?” Sam said. “You think this is _fun_ for me? I step out of that door every morning and I feel wrong in my own skin. I dress how I wanna dress and people stare at me like a freak, my own Dad looks at me like a freak. If I could just stop this, don’t you think I would?”

“That’s the dumbest goddamned thing I’ve ever heard. All you’ve gotta do is go in that room and change your clothes.”

“Sure,” Sam said. “Just look more like you? Like Dean? Throw on a leather jacket and go out and kill something? Quit school? If I do all that, will that make me a man?”

“Sam,” Dean said. 

“That isn’t what I mean,” John said.

Dean stepped in between them. “Dad, just stop. Look. Everyone’s angry, why don’t we just go to our corners and we’ll talk in the morning.”

“No,” Sam said. He turned and went back into his and Dean’s bedroom, started scooping things from the floor and closet and shoving them into a duffel bag. He had a roll of cash stuffed in a sneaker down at the bottom of the bag, and he thought it would be enough to buy him a bus ticket and a bed for a couple of nights; everything else, he’d figure out later. 

Dean had followed him into the room, though. Of course he’d followed. He grabbed Sam by the wrist and stopped him. 

“What are you doing?” 

“What’s it look like?”

Sam pulled away. He went back out into the living room.

“Sam,” John said. “Put the bag down and go to bed. I don’t have time for this shit tonight.”

“Don’t worry,” Sam said. “You won’t have to have this fight ever again. I’m not ever gonna be what you want me to be, and I think it’s time we stopped pretending that’s not the truth.”

“You’re just gonna run away?”

“I don’t have to,” Sam said, suddenly nervous. “It doesn’t have to be like this—the hunt or a life, one or the other. Can’t I just…can’t you just let me be? I’ll keep researching when you need it, but can’t I just live my life how I want to live it?”

“It doesn’t work like that. We all pull our weight around here,” John said. 

“And the only way for me to do that is if I’m like Dean?”

“Dean’s a hunter,” John said.

“Well then I guess I’m not.” 

He turned to leave. 

“Son,” John said. 

Sam paused. John looked sorry for a moment, a sadness the corners of his eyes and mouth, the same look he got every November 2nd when thoughts of Mary were too close. But the look passed just as quickly as it came and was replaced by a hardness that made Sam’s gut clench. He wanted his dad to pull him into a one armed hug and tell him he was a good kid. But his dad didn’t. 

“This is it, you hear me?” he said. “You leave now, I don’t want to see you back here again. I mean that.” 

“And where’s here, Dad?” Sam said, his voice far from steady. “It’s just another nowhere town. I hope to god I never end up back here again.”

When he moved to close the door behind him, he caught sight of Dean standing frozen against the wall, his face a twist of hurt and fear and indecision, and Sam almost turned back. He wanted to tell him _Come with me_ and _I’m not leaving you_ and _I’m sorry and I’ll stay forever if it means seeing you every day_ , but then John made the decision for him. He stepped into the light, put his hand against the door, and he closed it in Sam’s face.

***

It took about two weeks for Sam to really understand exactly what had happened. He found himself in a motel outside Palo Alto, ten dollars and a fake credit card in his wallet, staring at his phone. He’d been checking it almost obsessively since he’d gotten on a bus at the Amtrack station back in Flagstaff. It was almost unconscious—pull the phone out of his pocket, look at the screen, put it back in his pocket, repeat. It was a clunky thing that he’d hated from the second his father had put it in his hands and ordered him to “give no one the number and keep it on at all times unless you’re out on a hunt,” but now it was his only connection to Dean, and as he sat in that motel room, the fact that Dean hadn’t called him and the enormity of what that meant began to truly settle in. 

There hadn’t been one day in his entire life that he’d gone without talking to Dean at least once. 

He dialed Dean’s phone without even thinking. One, two, three rings later—“Sam?” Dean’s voice, worried, relieved, gruff. Sam hung up before he could tell Dean where he was and beg him to come. 

It got to be a habit, that nightly phone call. He’d let it get just far enough to hear Dean’s voice, and sometimes he’d even stay on the line for a moment or two, letting Dean talk to him. It was the only way he could sleep.

He’d gone to Palo Alto for a reason. He had an application to Stanford in a manila folder in his duffel, complete with applications for financial aid and scholarships. His admissions essay was already written and proofread, and he had two of his three recommendation letters. He’d been planning to send the application in as soon as he’d settled into a new school. But now he wouldn’t even have a high school diploma. Stanford was a pipe dream. 

“Sam?” The sound of Dean’s voice shot like static across the surface of Sam’s skin. He rubbed at the goosebumps on the soft skin of his forearm, the spot where Dean always rubbed Sam’s skin with his thumb, his fingers a circle around Sam’s wrist. “Sammy…” Dean said. “Dad’s sorry, you know? I mean…fuck, man. He actually cried.” 

Sam hung up the phone. The next morning, he dropped it to the sidewalk outside his room and crushed it beneath his heel. If he was going to do this, if he was going to figure out who the hell he was, what it meant to be _Sam_ , then he needed to know what it meant to be _Sam without Dean_ , and he couldn’t do that with Dean in his pocket day in and day out, a lifeline that lead straight back to something he didn’t understand how to want. 

 

V.

“You don’t look like you fit in here.”

Sam turned at the feel of the hand on his wrist. A year ago—another life ago—someone grabbing him unannounced would’ve probably resulted in that someone knocked on his ass just the way his brother had taught him. But Sam had worked at The Grind for going on eight months now, and he was used to the customers getting handsy. 

“Excuse me?” he said, shouting to be heard over the noise of the band. “Can I get you something, ma’am?”

The girl smiled at him. She was fucking gorgeous, her smile big and open, curly blonde hair in a mess tumbled over her shoulders. Sam’s eye wasn’t often turned by a woman, but for this one— _lips like Dean’s, plush and pink_ —he might make an exception. He smiled back at her. 

“I said you don’t look like you fit in here,” she said. “All the other waiters look like they belong at Chippendale’s.” 

Sam laughed. “Yeah, I guess I appeal to a different kind of customer.”

“That you do.” The girl bit her bottom lip, pulled it into her mouth. Her lips were shiny with gloss. She had a small mole between her eyes, and Sam imagined what it would be like to drag the tip of his nose across it the way Dean used to do to him. 

“Are you flirting with me?” Sam said. 

But before Sam could find out, another girl bounded up and grabbed the blonde by her arm, shouted something at her that made the blonde laugh and let the girl pull her away. 

On his break, Sam stood in the back alley and leaned against the brick wall. He lit a cigarette. If anyone asked, he’d say he took up smoking as an in to get to know the other guys at the bar, but he’d really started smoking because it reminded him of Dean. There were lots of things he did now with Dean in mind. The knife tucked into his boot—Dean. The old rock t-shirts—Dean (even if Sam did wear them tighter than Dean would ever have been comfortable with, and paired with girl’s jeans and a belt that matched his boots perfectly, thank you very much…). He tucked a loose strand of hair behind his ear. It was long enough now he could hold it back in a loose pony tail at the nape of his neck. Guys in California seemed to like that, and it emphasized his long neck, made him look just that extra bit more feminine. He blew smoke out through his nose and wished that just once he could let all of that go, wished that he didn’t have to constantly search for some magic trick that would make him feel that he looked on the outside the way he felt on the in. 

When the door from the kitchen cracked open, the sounds of pots and cursing and the smell of old grease spilling out, Sam wasn’t even surprised to see the blonde from earlier poke her head out. She smiled and shut the door behind her, leaned back against the wall next to him. She pulled his cigarette from his fingers, took a drag, then handed it back to him, blowing smoke out on a grin.

“I’m Jessica,” she said.

“Sam.”

“Hmm,” she nodded, tilted her head to the side and peered at him. “Is that short for Samuel or Samantha?”

“Does that matter?”

“Not at all. It’ll just make for a fun surprise when I get your pants off later.”

Sam angled his hips away from the wall. He knew if she looked, his crotch would look smooth. He’d long ago learned how to tuck his cock away. It wasn’t always comfortable, but it worked. Her eyes were dragged down to his crotch, and she scooted up closer to him. 

She raised an eyebrow. “Can I?”

Sam nodded, though he didn’t really know what she was asking for. Didn’t really care. She was as tall as Dean, and when she sidled up against him, slid her hand down his chest and down over his crotch, he barely even needed to tilt his head down to let her kiss him. He put his hand in her hair while she kissed him, let her press his lips open with her own, lick into his mouth. Her lip gloss tasted like Dr. Pepper, and that surprised a laugh out of him. 

She smiled against the corner of his mouth, rubbed her nose against his cheek. “You do a good job with this. You don’t even have a hint of stubble.”

Sam pulled away just enough to get a look at her. “You’ve decided I’m a boy then, huh?”

“Oh, honey,” she said. “You can almost pass. But hands like that?” She grabbed his wrist, moved his hand to her ass. She rubbed her nose against his neck. “This Adam’s apple?”

Sam sighed. “Yeah,” he said. “I know.”

“I’m sorry.”

Sam shrugged. “It’s fine. I don’t really want to pass anyway. Not really.”

Jessica looked at him like she didn’t believe him. Later, when they’d been together for two years, when she’d become his best friend, his lover, he’d tell her he wasn’t lying—Sam didn’t want to pass for anything. He wanted to be himself. He wanted to be _Sam_. It was just, when he’d met her, he’d still been trying to figure out what that meant. 

Jess took him back to her dorm that night. He should have known she was a student. Palo Alto was a college town, and The Grind was popular with Stanford kids trying to get away from the normal college bars. He stood awkwardly in the living room of her dorm room suite, took a beer when she handed him a bottle. In another life, Sam might have had this. But now all he had was a GED, a few community college classes, a dirty studio apartment with salt lines rubber-cemented in front of all the doors and windows, and a wardrobe most of Jess’s girlfriends would envy. 

“I don’t know if we should do this,” Sam said.

“Oh?” Jess said. She grabbed his shirt and pulled it over his head, knocking the beer out of his hand. 

He laughed and let her walk him backwards, push him through the door and onto his back on her bed. Some of her clothes were bunched up beneath his back, but when she straddled him, sat in his lap, and bent in half to kiss him, Sam found himself not really caring that the bed was a mess. 

Jess sat back and peered down at him, he swiped at her thigh with his thumb, the skin beneath her skirt warm, peach fuzz soft against the pad of his finger. He let her look her fill, let her pinch and flick at his nipples until he was too turned on to stay idle, and he dragged his hands up her sides, her toned waist seeming delicate against the size of his hands as she arched back into his grip and helped him remove her shirt. Sam unhooked her bra for her and she tossed it to the floor. He brushed his thumbs along the underside, the curve of her breasts, watched as her nipples peaked in the cool air. 

“You like girls?” Jess said. 

“You think I’d be here if I didn’t?” 

“Fair enough. But if there’s something you want, something more than I can give…”

Sam cocked an eyebrow. “You have something in mind?”

The smirk that crossed Jess’s face then rivaled even Dean’s. She looked smug, pleased, and she pulled one of his hands up to her face, sucked his thumb into her mouth, her lips a shiny pink “O”. Then she bit him, hard, and laughed before bounding off the bed. 

“I want you naked by the time I get back,” she called over her shoulder. 

Sam wasted no time, didn’t even get off the bed, just twisted and wriggled out of his jeans and threw them on the floor. He hesitated over his panties, tripping his fingers across the soft fabric, letting the feel of them shoot sparks through his cock. He decided to leave them on. He wanted her to see them. If she couldn’t handle it, then there was no point in this going any further. 

When she walked back in the room, he sat straight up, speechless. She was naked, all smooth skin and wicked messy curls in the dim light, the dip of her abdomen drawing Sam’s eyes to what was between her legs: curving slightly upward, proud, strapped to her body by intricately connected strips of leather, was a black dildo that made Sam’s mouth water just to look at it.

“This what you want, honey?” Jess said. She walked to him smooth as silk, pressed him back against the bed. “You gonna let momma take care of you?”

“Jesus fuck yes,” Sam said. 

Jess giggled. “I’ve been wanting to use this. By the look on your face, I’d say I finally found the right guy.”

“Yeah,” Sam said. 

He couldn’t take his eyes off of it. He wanted it inside him. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he thought _Dean Dean Dean_ ; he hadn’t had a cock in his ass since his brother. Hadn’t thought he’d ever want it again, content with back room blow jobs and hand jobs then going home to study all night and fall asleep with his dick in his hand, his fingers in his ass, and Dean’s name on his tongue. But this…he wanted this now. 

He flipped over quick onto his elbows and knees, arched his back, presenting himself to her. Sam felt her run a finger beneath the waist of his panties; she hooked the fabric and tugged it down until Sam’s ass was bare and his cock loose, his balls still trapped and held back by the fabric. 

“You made these all wet and messy,” Jess said. “Bad girl.” 

Sam shivered at the words. He dropped his head and pressed himself back further. 

She circled his hole with slick, cool fingers. She was almost tentative, and Sam didn’t know if she’d ever done this before. Maybe she hadn’t. Maybe this was a first for both of them. 

“It’s all right,” Sam said. His voice came out too rough, too masculine, and he flushed with shame at letting himself go so much he couldn’t control the way he sounded. “I…I want it. I want you to do it.”

“I’m gonna take such good care of you,” she said. 

She pulled his panties down as far as she could. They were trapped around his knees and Sam couldn’t spread his legs wide enough, so he whined, moaned “fuck, fuck, fuck” as she used slick fingers to open him up, tugging at the muscle, then pushing her fingers in deeper, working them in and out. He was achingly hard and dripping pre-come, and he reached back and cupped his cock and balls in his hand, pressed them back against his body. When she finally pushed inside of him, the dildo hard, unyielding, he moaned and pushed back, then he let her set the pace, rocking him forward so that he was humping his own hand. 

She folded over him, pushed his hair away from his neck and kissed him there, smearing lip gloss and saliva. He turned his head, and her lips moved up to his jaw. 

“Can you…” he said. “I’m gonna…oh, fuck, I’m gonna.”

“Come then, honey,” she said. Her voice sounded husky, fucked out; her skin was hot and slick, her breasts pressed just right against his back, and the dildo dragged across his prostate, and then his orgasm overtook him in waves, his cock pulsing against the palm of his hand, making everything slick and messy. Jess’s hips stuttered then, and she cried out in his ear as she rocked into her own orgasm. 

Jess pulled out carefully and rolled onto the bed. Sam just lay on his stomach and watched her. He could feel the grin on his face and the strands of hair stuck to his forehead with sweat. 

When she caught her breath, she looked at him and smiled. “Oh honey,” she said. “I think I’m gonna keep you around.” 

***

For four years, Sam and Jess were together. She studied and worked at the campus library; he pulled double shifts at The Grind and spent mornings making coffee at the campus Starbucks. There were times when it was as if he and Jess were just girlfriends, when they traded wardrobes and watched action movies and went to clubs together and danced until they were boneless and sore. Then there were times when Sam could think of nothing but Dean, when he closed his eyes and saw the brush of dark lashes against delicate skin, the sweep of a tongue across a full lip, strong square hands gripping a gun then gripping Sam by the waist and pulling him in. Times like that, Sam let Jess fuck him, let her hold him in her arms and buried his nose in her curls and tried to drown the memories with her scent. He went back to school at her urging. The state school wasn’t Stanford, but it was good. He studied law, then he studied sociology, then he spent a semester in the gender studies program trying to find answers before deciding he knew himself better than any book. 

Things were good for a long time, even if he did itch to pick up the phone and call Dean almost every day, even if he did talk to Dean when he was alone, as if Dean was in the room and could hear him. Things were good. Then Sam came home from work late one night to find his and Jess’s apartment burned to the ground and Jess burned with it.

 

VI. 

Sam called Dean. He wasn’t even sure that Dean would answer his phone after almost five years, wasn’t sure he’d even have the same number. But he’d sat in that shitty motel room ten hours after he’d found her, everything smelling of phantom smoke, tequila coating his tongue like ash, and he’d dialed because he’d had no other choice. 

Three rings later, and Dean was there. 

“Sam?” 

He sounded suspicious, and maybe a little panicked, and a lot relieved. 

Sam shut his eyes as tight as he could, pressed his thumb and forefinger against them until he was seeing little red starbursts that reminded him of the Fourth of July he and Dean had all but burned down a state park. 

He heard Dean sigh on the other end. “This again, huh? Well, at least I know you’re alive.”

Sam huffed a laugh. “Like you haven’t been keeping tabs on me.”

There was a pause, then, “So I check on you once in awhile.” Sam could almost hear him shrug. “You’re my brother.”

“I guess you haven’t checked on me lately, huh.”

“Sam?” Dean said. “What happened? Are you okay?”

“Can you come?” Sam said. 

“Yeah. It’ll take me…six hours, maybe? I’m close. Ish.” 

“Hurry.”

“Yeah, Sammy. You know I will.” 

When Dean knocked on the door five hours later, Sam was well and truly drunk and sloppy with it. He was still wearing the jeans from his shift at the bar. They were too tight, holes at the knee, one dangerously close to his crotch. A slouchy sweater hung off his shoulders and his hair was greasy and all up in his face. He stayed standing just long enough to get the door open, then he crumpled into his brother’s arms. 

“Whoa,” Dean said, barely stumbling as he grabbed at Sam, hauled him up to standing. “Hey, Sammy,” he said. His voice was soft. “You got big, huh? Man. Fuckin’ sasquatch. Heavy too. Let’s get your huge ass to bed.” He pushed Sam into the room and closed the door behind them. 

“Don’t you know you’re not supposed to make fun of a lady’s weight?” Sam mumbled. He couldn’t quite get his legs to work, so he was glad Dean supported him until he got to the bed and dropped down with a groan. 

“You may be a girl in there, Sammy, but you ain’t a lady. Not even close.” Dean said. He pushed Sam backwards until he lay down against the pillows. 

“Am too,” Sam said. 

Dean was taking Sam’s boots off and Sam felt comfortable and comforted, his big brother there, right where he should be. 

“She’s dead,” he said. 

He threw his arm over his face. Dean had paused in his work, was looking down at Sam’s feet—one bare and boney, one still booted—like they were the most interesting thing he’d ever seen.

“You hear me, Dean?” Sam said.

“Yeah,” Dean said. He cleared his throat and finished removing Sam’s shoe. He walked around the bed then and sat down next to Sam. He peeled Sam’s arm away from his face. “What do you need?”

“I don’t know,” Sam said. 

Dean pursed his lips, patted Sam on the chest. “You need a haircut, baby sis.”

Sam smiled at the words. All this time and Dean still tried to be what Sam needed. 

“Do not,” Sam said. And he thought he said something else, but he fell asleep while the words slipped out of his mouth. 

***

There was never any question. After everything that had happened, Sam knew he would leave with Dean. They stayed in Palo Alto for five days—just long enough for Sam to go to the funeral and to have Jess’s parents tell him they knew how much Jess loved him all the while looking at him like they were glad to be rid of him. Dean stood at his shoulder and made mocking comments about the clichéd big black sunglasses and black umbrellas that dotted the crowd. They both stood out—Dean in Dad’s old leather jacket and stained jeans, Sam in his favorite little black dress because Jess had bought it for him and would want him to wear it and fuck everyone who gave him looks because of it. When the funeral was over, Sam and Dean walked back to the Impala, and Sam ran his hand across the roof, tapped on it once. 

“She looks good,” he said once they were both inside. “I’ve been meaning to tell you since you got here.”

“You had other things on your mind.”

Sam nodded. “She gave you away, you know?”

Dean raised an eyebrow at him. 

“The car. When you came to check on me. Even when you thought you were out of sight, even then, I could hear her engine. Dead giveaway.” 

“Sorry,” Dean said, though he didn’t sound all that apologetic. 

Sam shrugged. “I’m glad you were there. It…I don’t know.” He waved a hand through the air, not quite sure how to say what he meant.

“Had to watch out for you,” Dean said. “You’re my brother.” 

“Yeah,” Sam said. “Well, thanks. And thanks for coming.” 

Dean’s hand shifted across the seat, but he stopped, pulled it back, wrapped his fingers around the steering wheel. His hands were rougher than Sam remembered them being. The tip of his ring finger was bent slightly as if it’d been broken and reset badly. Suddenly, Sam couldn’t keep himself from touching. He grabbed Dean’s hand and pulled it to him.

Dean tensed and started to pull back, but then he stopped, let Sam look. 

“Broke it hunting pixies outside Sioux Falls,” Dean said. 

“Pixies?” Sam said. He laughed. “Pixies broke your finger?”

“They’re mean little fuckers,” Dean said. “Broke a lot more than that.”

Sam nodded. Swallowed. “I should have been there,” he said. 

“Oh, they would’ve fucking loved you. They kept trying to nest in my hair. That mop of yours? Would’ve been fucking pixie heaven.”

“No,” Sam said. “I don’t just mean the pixies. I mean—”

“I know what you mean,” Dean said. He pulled his hand away. 

“I’m sorry,” Sam said. “That I left. That—”

“Sam,” Dean said. His voice was a warning. “Let’s just…you’re back now, right? Fuck everything else.”

“Okay,” Sam said.

“Say it,” Dean said.

Sam smiled a little. “Fuck everything else,” he said.

“Me and you against the world.”

“Me and you against the world,” Sam said.

Dean’s answering grin was wicked, full of childish glee and promise of trouble. Sam’s heart was still broken and his head was swirling with thoughts he couldn’t wrangle, but Dean was beside him and offering him some kind of future. So Sam sat back, the leather of the seat sun-warmed beneath his bare thighs, Dean beside him gunning the engine like all the problems in the world could be solved with a fast car and a _fuck ‘em all_ attitude. And hell, right now, Sam was willing to believe his brother was right.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to the amazing fufaraw for betaing. She did a fantastic job. Any remaining mistakes are my own. And thanks to meus_venator for reading this through and providing fantastic feedback.
> 
> Unfortunately, no art was posted for this story.


End file.
